Will this scan from my screen?

Yes, as long as the terminal font renders block characters at roughly square proportions and the window is not zoomed so small the blocks blur together. Most modern terminal fonts work fine.

What error correction should I pick?

M (15%) is a good default. Pick H (30%) if the code will be photographed or partially obscured; pick L (7%) if you need to pack in the most data and the terminal image will stay pristine.

Can I use it in a shell script?

Yes. The tool exposes a GET endpoint that returns plain text, so a single curl call can print a QR code from inside any script or CI pipeline.

Terminal QR Code: free, private, in your browser

Input

Error correction

Invert (dark background)

Quiet zone

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What it does

Renders a QR code as unicode block characters, the same trick qrencode -t UTF8 uses, so it prints and scans directly from a terminal window. Works for any text or URL, with adjustable error correction and quiet zone.

How to use it

Paste the text or URL you want encoded and the terminal-friendly QR appears immediately. It also runs as a plain curl endpoint, so `curl https://tools.maxhogan.dev/api/terminal-qr-code?input=...` prints a scannable code straight into any shell, over SSH, or in a CI log.

Why this one

Most QR generators only hand back a PNG or SVG, which is useless when you are stuck in a terminal or SSH session with no image viewer. This one is text in, text out, with no ads, no signup, and no server ever seeing what you encoded.

FAQ

Will this scan from my screen?: Yes, as long as the terminal font renders block characters at roughly square proportions and the window is not zoomed so small the blocks blur together. Most modern terminal fonts work fine.
What error correction should I pick?: M (15%) is a good default. Pick H (30%) if the code will be photographed or partially obscured; pick L (7%) if you need to pack in the most data and the terminal image will stay pristine.
Can I use it in a shell script?: Yes. The tool exposes a GET endpoint that returns plain text, so a single curl call can print a QR code from inside any script or CI pipeline.

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